Drawbacks to Linking with low/no PR sites?

**ohiosweetheart** · 12-20-2006, 10:01 PM

What are the drawbacks, if any, to exchanging links with sites with low/no PR?

**Code Monkey** · 12-20-2006, 10:15 PM

You don't get much in return?

You don't get penalized if that's what you mean.

**ohiosweetheart** · 12-21-2006, 07:37 PM

ok, thank you Code Monkey

**Brandon Sheley** · 12-21-2006, 07:46 PM

It's sort of like a short term retirement program for your site.

If they pay off, it'll pay off good in a year or two

**eric** · 12-22-2006, 11:40 PM

And a site is not there to have a pr, content is what will make it a success, and to link just to have pr links.... if it is in no way related to your topics.. people coming over will just go away as quickly...

**brandondrury** · 12-30-2006, 09:25 AM

While I've hit the SEO thing quite hard, I'm beginning to think that excessively overthinking it is a bad idea.

Get links. It's about as simple as that. If you go out of your way to build links with black hat tricks and such, you may get banned (or make millions). If you don't do any work to get links, you'll probably never rank.

If you link to sites for linking purposes alone, you have done no good to you or your visitors. If a site has a reason to be linked to, I link to it. That's it. I never question the SEO ramifications of linking to a useful site because there are no negative consequences.

However, the fatal flaw with the whole SEO thing is to really rank for the big terms, it would cost a fortune. Assuming you spent a $1,000,000 on links at digitalpoint or textlinkads, you still wouldn't rank for music download or real estate.

To really rank for big terms, it takes about $5,000,000 worth of "free" links or at least links that you didn't directly pay for.

We dumped $13k into SEO for a site for payday loans and our returns have been...well....horrible. Of course, we paid a high end firm to do it (thinking they would do a good job). All they did was submit to directories...lots of them. They bought one authority link for $300 per month. That was it. The traffic has been almost non-existant.

In my experience thus far, people only link to things they can't recreate on their own site in a reasonable amount of time. Great videos can't be recreated and therefor need to be linked to. Great articles....well you can take the 3 main points of any great article and rewrite it into a blog. I don't think great articles will snag big links.

I think the real money is in creating tools with php, java, etc. People have no problem linking to tools. There is no way to recreate what a tool does on a site without physically installing the tool on your site. Of course, the benefit of being the first to make this tool is lost.

I think the digitalpoint forums illustrate the power of tools in an extraordinary way.

The site has had no SEO done to it. It is a site that sells software. Oh, by the way, we'll put this little forum up in a dark corner of the site. Keep in mind that selling software is not even directly related with a webmaster forum. In fact, it's about like putting a webmaster forum on a spa site or something...well....almost.

Before you know it, that forum is the largest webmaster forum online (probably one of the most competitive keywords online). I've seen the owner, Shawns, Adwords check and it was...well....huge.

How did he do it?
Free Webmaster Tools & Search Engine Optimization Tools

That's how... and he just got ANOTHER link.

Brandon

**Brandon Sheley** · 12-30-2006, 10:14 PM

I had thought about adding a bunch of tool on this site for that Very reason but I quickly realized how much of a strain those tools can put on your server..

**eric** · 12-30-2006, 11:15 PM

I can take quite some bw and... you have to maintain them to latest... But it is indeed for many sites the motor... Good content like simple howto's for beginners and scripts... seems that is what many look for. Mny ISP now offer some little spot for free and most want to have something up to share... and it ain't easy when you start.
Reason Fantastico is such a success, you can hardly make it easier as host provider...

**brandondrury** · 12-31-2006, 07:20 AM

Quote:

I had thought about adding a bunch of tool on this site for that Very reason but I quickly realized how much of a strain those tools can put on your server..

Think about that one for just a second. Assuming you want to be a big time forum like digitalpoint (or even 1/3 that big) would you rather pay the extra $100-200 for hosting per month or an extra $50,000 per month in purchased links.

Brandon

**Brandon Sheley** · 12-31-2006, 07:35 AM

well right now, I can't afford the extra 100$ a month..lol

but I understand your point

**Code Monkey** · 12-31-2006, 07:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by brandondrury

Think about that one for just a second. Assuming you want to be a big time forum like digitalpoint (or even 1/3 that big) would you rather pay the extra $100-200 for hosting per month or an extra $50,000 per month in purchased links.

Brandon

Well, Digital Point just paid over $100,000 for new equipment to keep up with the demand so the point is kind of mute. You have to pay to play no matter what your angle is.

**brandondrury** · 12-31-2006, 08:20 AM

I know the feeling. However, you've just got to jump in balls deep sometimes.

Like they on Shawshank Redemption...."Get busy living or get busy dieing".

While I refuse to ever be in debt financially, I figure that most people are blowing their money on purses, jeans, or Outback Steak. I may as well blow my money on stuff that could really pay off in the long run....before someone else does.

Brandon Drury

Quote:

Well, Digital Point just paid over $100,000 for new equipment to keep up with the demand so the point is kind of mute.

Mute??? Are you saying that it's not worth it? Do you think Digitalpoint said "You know...that's a big investment. Maybe we should just stay small or quit"?

The point is hardly mute. They'll pay for that in 8 months or less. That's about like a concrete company buying a new truck. There are always costs to doing business. It just so happens that great tools and hosting are a lot cheaper than buiding a restaurant or starting a storefront. If you don't believe me, take a look at the prices for advertising in magazines or even your local newspaper. IT'S OUTRAGEOUS!!

The average car dealer in my area sinks $100,000 into radio advertising every year. They still afford $2,000,000 buildings and multiple employees.

I think webmasters, in general, are spoiled. We've had it so easy to make money. The game is getting tougher every day. I'll gladly sink some money into a site I believe in.

Brandon

**Brandon Sheley** · 12-31-2006, 01:24 PM

my wife works at an advertising agency and they don't take a new client unless they are willing to drop 250k into ad's.

Trust me, I know it takes money to make money

hence, why I keep spending money on this site, I know It'll pay off

**BikeForums** · 01-02-2007, 03:07 PM

Work smart, not hard.

For $3k, I can go buy 10 good links for a year. Chances are, if the links are truly 'good', I'll make my 3k back, and then some.

Rather then spend hours upon hours finding good sites that will sell on-topic links, I can spend that time coming up with a good idea for a cool tool, spend $3k to have a programmer create it for me, then release it to my forum members. If the tool is worth its salt, I'll end up with dozens, or hundreds of links. Links that will last more then a year, and links that will be on topic to the tool, and to my website.

Theres lots of webmasters that will gladly send out link request emails for 8hrs a day, theres a few SEOs that send out link buy emails 2 or 3 hrs a day. But the truly successful create amazing content or amazing tools that create links naturally and organically.

**Brandon Sheley** · 01-02-2007, 05:13 PM

Wonder what kind of tool would work for this type of site ?

**BikeForums** · 01-02-2007, 05:23 PM

Thats the hard part.

**PC101** · 01-03-2007, 03:17 PM

The Digital Point tools... are they ones they designed themselves? Or, are they open source type tools/software??

Thanks!

Lyte

**Brandon Sheley** · 01-03-2007, 04:29 PM

I'm sure theirs are custom, but you can find free version of most those if you want to run them on your site at this site.. Free SEO Tools

**PC101** · 01-03-2007, 08:25 PM

Ohh... good link! I didn't know 'bout that those! :bouncy-blue:

So, would I use that VB Link/Download hack in order to offer those??

Thanks!

Lyte

**Brandon Sheley** · 01-03-2007, 09:24 PM

um, i don't know how you would want to share them.

btw, i sent u an email

**PC101** · 01-04-2007, 08:00 AM

I'll check my emails.

What I mean is... if I wanted to set up a SEO tools area on PC101... what do y'all think would be the best way to do that? I was thinking the L/D hack from VB.org... is there a better way?

Lyte

**Brandon Sheley** · 01-04-2007, 10:18 AM

if you use some of the tools from that link you can just dl the zip to your desktop and then upload the folder to your site

most don't need any editing.. like I have some that I put up when I first started the site but had to take them down.. here is the link

Overture Suggestion Tool - Find the most searched keywords!
also in the /1page_rank/ and /1page-rank/ folder